Chapter 39 : Master and Disciple (1)

Chapter 39: Master and Disciple (1)

Shatien had spent several days reading and rereading the history book his master had given him.

At first it felt dull, but as he learned under his master and kept reading, things started to come into focus and it became fun.

When something you know appeared on the page, you just wanted to confirm it and show off what you knew.

It was exactly like that.

In particular, Shatien sank deep into interest as he found wars in history that matched the countless battlefields he had experienced in the past.

Thanks to that, the result was this.

‘Huh. This fellow really is a curious one.’

The old man smiled faintly as he watched Shatien sit and read all day.

The man probably had never truly read a book in his life, yet he was reading with surprising focus.

Even the occasional questions he posed carried real insight.

They were the kind of questions you could never ask if you knew nothing about combat.

‘Interesting. He asks questions like a veteran with a wealth of combat experience…’

Given his background, it was unlikely he had studied separately, so the old man could not see how this was possible.

Usually there was only one explanation for this kind of thing.

He had taken part in many battles for real.

Yet that did not make sense when the old man considered the age of this young mercenary disciple.

He had heard the man had only just joined.

‘It seems the mysterious power is helping him in this field as well.’

In the end, that was the only way to think about it.

That a mysterious power could even influence intellect. It was a truly tremendous ability.

‘If this goes well, he might grow into a decent commander. Heh heh.’

Expectation rose in the old man’s eyes.

Lately, nothing pleased him more than teaching Shatien.

* * *

Another month passed.

During that time, Shatien practiced swordsmanship in the morning and learned strategy and tactics from the history books in the afternoon.

In the meanwhile, he also drilled the Mercenary Company’s Centurion during his spare moments, so from his perspective the schedule felt murderous.

Even so, Shatien enjoyed it. He could feel himself growing day by day.

His growth in swordsmanship in particular was swift. By now he had learned all the technical aspects from his master.

His master even said, “I have nothing more to teach. What remains is for you to keep exploring and realizing on your own as you live,” and then devoted most of his time to teaching strategy and tactics.

‘So that is why we fought that way back then.’

Thanks to that, Shatien could reconstruct his past experiences with greater precision.

He reviewed how he had moved during the large scale battles he had joined, and he probed endlessly into what would have been better.

He had finally reached the point where he could make judgments on his own.

“Good. This is enough for strategy and tactics.”

“Really?”

“There is no need to feel disappointed. In the end, what is in the book remains only in the book. Once you try to apply it in the real world, you will see it does not unfold exactly as written. Hehe.”

Saying that, the old man pulled Shatien along to his office.

“Do you want to try using what you have learned?”

“Well, I do… but how would we do that, Master?”

They could not suddenly march out with the Centurion and pick a fight with someone. If they did, the city’s defense forces might crush them as madmen.

“Hehe. There is a good way.”

—Swoosh.

With his words, the old man took from a drawer a square wooden board that looked like a chessboard.

Each piece stood for a hundred men, and only the pieces with flags represented knights.

‘He had something like this? Fascinating.’

As Shatien watched with curiosity, the old man explained slowly. He covered the rules, what each piece symbolized, and so on.

“So, do you understand everything?”

“It is very realistic. I understand, Master.”

“Good. Then think of this board as a plain and form your battle line.”

“All right. But why did you bring that silver basin beside it? And what is that strange liquid inside?”

The old man smiled at that.

“If I let you play as you like, you will take it as a joke and get sloppy. Put your left hand in the silver basin, just like I am doing.”

Shatien obediently put his hand in.

It went in without much resistance.

Each time he wriggled his fingers, something slick like pig fat caught against his hand.

‘?’

The old man dropped one infantry piece with a plop into the basin.

—Fwoooosh.

‘Hm, it got a little warm?’

“What you have your hand in is the tissue of a dead black slime. Black slimes live by eating wood, so the moment wood enters their body they react and heat themselves up. It is the same even after death.”

“How hot does it get?”

“Since it is dead, it does not get that hot. Still, it will not be easy to ignore. Let me show you. Hehe.”

The old man dropped a bit of firewood into Shatien’s basin. The slime tissue began bubbling, sending out heat more and more.

“The moment you pull your hand out, you lose. Think of it as the same as fleeing under the pressure of the battlefield.”

Even after he removed the wood, the liquid in the basin kept boiling. It looked like it would be difficult to endure once it reached a certain point. Only then did Shatien realize why all the pieces were made of wood.

—Sssshhhh.

“Do we just dump it in the sand afterward?”

“It is disposable anyway. Nobles use it to teach during their lessons, so it is not all that expensive.”

That was of course, only by a noble’s standards. For a petty noble with a small estate in the provinces, it would be a burden. It took a certain level of wealth, or a court noble, to afford it.

The old man truly was investing quite a bit in this new disciple.

“Now then, shall we see how you do? I want to see how well my disciple performs.”

With that, the old man began placing his pieces on the opposite side of the board.

Seeing this, Shatien gave a wry smile.

‘So he has no intention of going easy on me huh.’

The number and composition of the pieces on the board were identical.

“Very well, Master. Please teach me a lesson.”

—Clack.

Shatien deployed his line.

He arrayed a hundred archers on the foremost rank, three hundred heavy infantry directly behind them, and held a hundred light infantry in reserve just in case.

On both flanks he prepared thirty knights each to blunt any enemy cavalry charge.

“A textbook formation huh. Are you not being too classical? Heh. Then I will step in.”

The old man placed sixty knights straight to the front.

He set three hundred infantry in the center, then split one hundred archers and one hundred light infantry on the flanks.

As his words suggested, it was a very aggressive formation.

“I will attack first. I send the knights to charge head on.”

With that, he advanced the sixty knights in front.

By the rules, knights moved faster than regular infantry and could move three squares at a time.

In a moment, the distant field shrank.

The foremost archers were exposed to danger.

“Well then… I answer with archers.”

“You know you can attack only once per turn, yes? If you shoot twice, your archers enter the knights’ range. What will you do?”

It meant he had to decide whether to sacrifice the archers to remove the knights.

Shatien nodded.

“I will shoot twice.”

“Not a bad decision. From a classical view.”

The old man smiled faintly as he said it.

Even if he lost many archers, killing the knights would tilt the battle in his favor.

Knights were that powerful of a force.

—Ssshhh.

The old man recovered the fallen ten knights and dropped them into his basin.

When the next turn came, his cavalry crashed into the two ranks of archers.

Because they were spread out and thinly strung, the damage was not as great as it could have been, but even so, a cavalry lance charge was nothing to ignore.

—Ssshhh.

Nearly thirty archers collapsed in an instant. Shatien’s pieces went plunking into his basin.

“Mm.”

Shatien was startled by how quickly the temperature rose. It was a little hotter than bathwater.

“So, what will you do?”

“I pull the archers back one step to reorganize them. In their place, I commit the heavy infantry immediately.”

“Oh? You intend to pin my knights’ feet?”

“Yes. And at the same time, I send my knights from both flanks.”

“Ho ho. So you intend to trap and destroy my knights completely.”

The old man laughed heartily.

It was the classic hammer and anvil tactic often seen in ancient warfare.

Once pinned, it was difficult to break the encirclement until you were wiped out. He would have to decide quickly.

“Very well.”

He split his knights as he spoke.

“Then I sacrifice ten knights. Ten serve as bait while I pull the rest back. And I advance my archers to strike from both flanks.”

“Ah…?”

Shatien felt thoroughly caught off guard. He had never even imagined such an order.

He had saved his archers from annihilation, but he failed to destroy the knightly force as planned. On top of that, his infantry began dropping in clumps under the archer fire that the master rained from both flanks.

—Ssssh.

—Ssshhh.

Pieces plunked into each other’s basins.

Now the heat had risen to the point that it felt a little burdensome.

Neither had any thought of backing down.

“Quite impressive. Thanks to you, I lost many knights. But what will you do now? I’m going to keep attacking.”

The old man’s advanced archers kept hammering from both sides.

If he stayed put, the damage would pile up.

Having lost his archers, Shatien had no choice but to carry out the charge he had planned.

“I order a general charge. My knights give chase first.”

Shatien pulled the encircled knights to the front.

If he did that, the old man would have no answer but to block the knights with infantry.

The knightly mounts, having already charged once, were too tired to be used immediately again.

“Hmmm. A decent plan, but all right. Then I have all my knights dismount and form the front line.”

“Wha?!”

Too late, Shatien realized his mistake. The moment knights dismounted, they became fearsome heavy infantry, sturdy enough to endure a lance charge once.

‘Come to think of it, that part did not appear in the old military histories.’

He had simply failed to think of it.

Shatien felt he had been caught off guard.

Even so, he could not retract his orders now.

He had already spent a turn, and ten more knights had been spent under the archer fire.

“Focus, Shatien. A commander does not hesitate. Imagine this is a real battlefield and bring the image to mind. Then decide.”

“Understood.”

—Crunch.

The lance charge smashed into the dismounted knights and the enemy’s heavy infantry. With a massive shock, the dismounted knights flew backward. They sprang up at once and locked shields into a formation. Some fell, but the thick plate of the knights let them withstand the charge. They even carried shields, which helped even more.

Of course, that did not mean they took no damage.

The old man’s dense mass of infantry had been pierced here and there.

Even so, because the old man had stacked his infantry entirely on the front, the depth of his formation remained thick.

Instead of collapsing, it held and even wrapped around to encircle.

—Fwish.

In that instant, a rain of arrows fell over the heads of the tangled knights and heavy infantry.

It targeted Shatien’s heavy infantry that was charging up from behind.

With the front jammed by the knot of bodies, Shatien’s heavy infantry had no choice but to halt where they were.

—Ssshhh.

—Plunk plunk plunk.

Pieces tumbled into Shatien’s basin in an instant.

Now the heat truly grew hard to bear.

Even so, it was too early to give up.

On the frontal line at least, his side still held the stronger force.

The knights hit hard. If he endured once more, regrouped, and charged again, he could still win.

“I advance my reorganized archers. And I reorganize the knights.”

“Oh. In that tangle, you say? Hehe. Then I will do this.”

—Tack. Tap tap. Tack.

The old man’s hands moved quickly.

He rushed the light infantry that had been guarding the archers on both flanks.

Slower than knights but faster than heavy infantry, they moved two squares and in an instant encircled Shatien’s army from both sides, cutting off the knights’ retreat.

“Ah—”

Only then did Shatien let out a sigh.

“I lost.”